Study On The Federal Judicial Politics Of The United States

The United States, in the process of constitutional democracy construction and development, is constantly faced with the problem of reconciliation between constitutionalism and democracy. As a crucial constituent part of constitutional system, the federal judicial system serves to protect American constitutional order. The development course of American constitutional democracy makes clear that the federal courts serve as the interpreter of constitution and laws, power restrictor and rights protector, and balancer between society and politics, acting as a "essential sprockets" connecting "constitutionalism and democracy", and play an important political role in maintaining American political institutions and constitutional democracy.Since the founding of the United States, scholars and statesmen have proposed a series of theories on federal judicial politics, including "the least dangerous branch","limited’enormous political power’owners", pragmatic "judicial legislation", convergent policy-making,"counter-majoritarian dilemma" and "flypaper courts" and etc. Judges, in most cases, employ different interpretation criteria due to various influencing factors. Generalization of so-called "interpretivism" and "noninterpretivism" thus expresses differences in judicial principles used by judges in the process of judicial adjudication, which, as a result, generates the concepts of judicial activism and judicial restraint. However, whichever interpretation criteria or principles employed, federal courts and judges of the United States are given the rights to interpret and guard constitution and laws by history, especially the application of judicial review power, which makes the federal courts become a powerful barrier against political domineering and continuously elevates the status in American political systems.Since1950s and1960s, federal courts of the United States have broken away from the passive state in the past and began to play a new role in protecting civil rights. A series of issues, including maintaining due process, guarding minority rights, gender equality, protecting privacy and freedom of expression, were placed in front of the federal courts. Protecting civil rights, to a certain degree, is demonstrated as dealing with relationship between government and individuals, interpreting and defending the constitution, the bill of rights and citizens’freedom and equality rights. The federal courts provide an expression channel for appeals for interests of minority groups by trying court cases, which presents the trend of social value.The federal judicial system of the United States is often faced with a dilemma in the process of judicial decision and interpreting legislations. Limited by the natural passivity and institutional rules of the judicial system and based on the consideration of its own authority and diversity of American social interests, the federal courts usually act cautiously in judicial judgments, show the features of practicability in the philosophy of pragmatism and the common law tradition. The federal courts use different methods in different areas adopting "pragmatic" attitude, and use "majority principle" to make a decision on tough issues. In the meantime, the federal courts employ obfuscation treatments on specific problems to answer counter-majoritarian dilemma, balance social and political development while harmonizing various strained relations, and carefully promote social and political transformation and advancement.